


Words

by Skittymon



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: F/M, au soulmates, dont be fooled tho, this isn't happy lmao
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-05
Updated: 2018-07-05
Packaged: 2019-06-05 14:23:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15172610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skittymon/pseuds/Skittymon
Summary: Zarcray 2017 week prompt 7: AU





	Words

Love has always been a confusing topic for Zarc. He’s never had, or at least that he can remember, a mother or father to give him a parent’s love filled with what Zarc assumes is kisses on the cheeks and pats on the back. He’s never managed to keep friends for long periods of time and at the moment he can’t come up with anyone who he can call a friend. 

To top it all off both of his wrists are completely blank.

Zarc has been told since a young age that once someone hits their teenage years words will appear on their wrist. The first words your soulmate speaks to you. Yet here he is, almost twenty years old and apparently has no soulmate, someone to (finally) love him for the rest of his life.

Well, at least he has his dragons.

* * *

He tries to love people and show them affection. When Zarc duels he puts all his passion into making it a show, for himself and his audience. He climbs onto of his beloved Odd-Eyes and gets enraptured by the cheers and applause from his fans and believes he truly belongs and is loved.

Then one day he hurts his opponent.

Zarc feels awful and sick and wants to help the guy, but then almost one-by-one the crowd begins to cheer for him. Overlooking the fact that the other man is on the ground bleeding. 

The pro-duelist is confused because he believes that love is suppose to be compassion toward others and caring about each other. Not…not asking, cheering,  _begging,_ for more blood. He learns that day that love is listening to what the people you care for say and doing what they ask.

So when his four dragons, the only ones in the world who have always been by his side and love him more than anyone else has in his life, ask to destroy everything around them how could he say no?

* * *

When you truly love someone you become one with them and bring forth a new life, at least that’s what Zarc has been told throughout his life. So becoming one with his dragons to create the new life form known as Supreme Dragon King Zarc, he thinks he finally has gotten love right.

The cries and pleads and shouts for mercy fall deaf on Zarc’s ears. As long as his dragons wish for destruction so will he. And he continues to do so until one day a  ~~beautiful~~  woman appears on a cliff to battle him.   

He says nothing to her and begins to blast at her. The woman doesn’t falter in the slightest and remains grounded. Zarc frowns that, his game has been ruin so fast - he enjoys seeing his prey panic and cower before he finishes them off.

Before he can do anything else to the girl wordlessly places four cards on her duel disk and life that Zarc hasn’t seen in so long begins to flourish around him. Then when the forces of nature get close enough to him he feels horrible pain.

He’s being forcibly separated from his dragons.

“YOU BASTARD!!” he shouts at the girl standing before him. Her stoic facade is broken and her eyes widen, but Zarc doesn’t care - he’s furious.

“Unforgivable, unforgivable, you are unforgivable!” he states as his voice begins to separate along with his dragons. 

He glares at the woman one last time.

Then silently, they divide into four.

* * *

Ray has known love all her life. From her father showering her with affection and kindness from the moment she was born, to her friends and fans who encourage her to be the best version of herself that she can achieve.

But she begins question it when she turns thirteen and her soulmate mark appears on her right wrist. Written in all uppercase are the words: “YOU BASTARD!!”

Her father takes the event much better than Ray. He jokes to her that her stubborn take-no-shit attitude will probably piss off her soulmate, or that maybe their a sore loser who will yell at Ray after she defeats him in a duel.

Leo’s words help puts most of Ray’s worries about her mark to the back of her mind, but still she can’t help feel like something seems off and decides to wear long sleeves at all times.

* * *

When Ray first sees Zarc it’s during one of his matches and she’s captivated by his dueling. From how he asks the audience to chime in when he does the math to deduct life points from his opponent, how he jumps on his Odd-Eyes and truly battle side-by-side with his monsters,  ~~to his glorious smile that makes Ray feel nearly as happy as he appears to be.~~

His duels are truly a performance and Ray wants to be apart of it.

However, she isn’t the only one who has the same idea and the wait list to duel Zarc has her scheduled for three months from now. Ray accepts the wait, but she still wants to talk to him. To tell him how much his duels inspire her to work along side her monster and how she looks forward to watching the duels he performs in.

When she tries to get close to his waiting room it’s surrounded by countless girls with autograph books, flowers, chocolate, pictures of himself begging to be signed, and hope that Zarc will speak to one of them and discover he’s their soulmate. Ray can spot his signature silver and green hair and can hear speak to crowd of girls, “Ladies, ladies! This is too much, you don’t have to do all this for little ol’ me.”

It’s when the girls start to scream and squeal in protest that Ray decides to come back another day and talk to him some other time.

* * *

Ray feels her body go numb when she sees Zarc’s opponent spill out blood on the area floor. She isn’t the only one; when she looks at the telecaster she can see Zarc’s colorless face and haunted eyes. The area is utterly silent for a good ten seconds.

Then people start applauding Zarc for his victory and the crowd erupts in cheers and Ray is horrified that everyone is okay with this. However, it isn’t until Zarc accepts their cheers and forgets his opponents injuries does she get up, leave the stadium, and cancels her duel with Zarc.

* * *

As the weeks pass Ray realizes that she isn’t the only one who has decided not to duel Zarc. Ray doesn’t keep up with his duels as much, because each one seems to be worse than the one before, but she knows that duelist are afraid to battle him and there’s only a handful of brave (Ray prefers to think of them as idiotic) duelists left who willingly stand against Zarc.

When the publicity announces that the final duel against Zarc Ray decides to go see him duel one last time, hoping that he’ll realize that people are scare of him and will return to the old dueling style Ray fell in love with.

* * *

The duel ends in the most ruthless way yet and Ray is honestly surprised that the man isn’t dead. Zarc pays no mind to him and being to shout at the crowd, asking if there is anyone else willingly to battle him. He and his monsters aren’t satisfied and crave more. 

He states that he and his monster have no equal, that they are too powerful.

That they have the power to destroy the world.

Ray stares in horror as Zarc summons his four dragons and they in begin to attack the people in the audience. 

Her father grabs her and both of them rush out of the stadium along with everyone else. Ray turns her head to the man she once thought so highly of and all she can see is a monster.

* * *

Apparently Zarc thought the same and he physically became a monster to match his personality. One that is cruel and vile and horrible and destroys everything in his path.

Many duelist try to defeat the monster but none are able to even put a dent into Zarc’s reign of terror. Ray wants to help in the fight against the Supreme King but her father forbids it and instead she helps other find refugee and stay on guard in case Zarc visits the region they are in. He never does.

Her father seems to have finally found a way to defeat Zarc and leaves to travel the world to find pure life energy from the flowers, moon, wind, and birds.

Ray stays behind along with the dozen other survivors and each day her father is away she feels her anger and hated grow more and more.

* * *

When her father finally comes back he wastes no time converting the life energy into four duel monster cards to fight against Zarc. It’s when the powers are being uploaded to the cards does Leo tell Ray the hard truth: Using the four cards will most likely kill him.

Ray is furious, she can’t lose her father to that monster. Not when he has stolen her peace, her home, her friends, her happiness. Zarc can’t take her father from her too.

So when the cards are finally created Ray takes them and doesn’t look back.

* * *

After blocking the trail so her father can’t catch up to her, Ray finally comes face to face with the Supreme King.

It takes a few moments him to realize that Ray is standing before him but when does he unleashes blasts of energy at Ray. 

Ray has been told by many of the survivors that Zarc likes to toy with his prey and pretend to fire at them when the blasts are meant to miss. Ray keeps her ground, Zarc has taken so much from her, she won’t let him get any type of satisfaction from her.

 The moment he stops and the smoke clouds clear Ray immediately places the four cards on her duel disk - the quicker the Supreme King dies, the better.

Life itself soon surrounds the two of them and it feels Ray with emotions she hasn’t felt in so long. Her chest feels lighter and bubbly and she almost forgets where she is.

“YOU BASTARD!!” The Supreme King shouts in anger and pain.

Her blood runs cold and she loses her composure.

No, no, no, no, no,  _NO._

Her soulmate.

Her soulmate is the devil himself.

She must be in some sort of shock because she can’t hear a word Zarc - the devil, the Supreme Dragon King, her soulmate - is saying to her.

Ray wants to protest, to cry out in defiance, to declare that this isn’t fair, but no words escape from her mouth.

Then with one last thought of how unfair life can be, Ray splits into four.


End file.
